Gillies corner

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Edit summary

I'm putting the image that your removed, at Tobacco advertising, back into the article. If you have a reason to delete something, you should provide an explanation in the edit summary when you do the edit. Otherwise, people (like me) are likely to think your edit is just vandalism, and revert it. That wastes their time and yours. John Broughton 13:34, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

External links

Please do not add commercial links (or links to your own private websites) to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising or a mere collection of external links. You are, however, encouraged to add content instead of links to the encyclopedia. If you feel the link should be added to the article please discuss it on the article's talk page rather than re-adding it. See the welcome page to learn more about Wikipedia. Thanks. Petros471 13:43, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Blocked

You have been temporarily blocked from editing Wikipedia for continuing to add spam links. If you wish to make useful contributions, you are welcome to come back after the block expires.

Ian Manka Talk to me! 13:48, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Removing tobacco images

Thank you for posting on my talk/discussion page about why you removed advertising images in various wikipedia articles. As someone who has never smoked, and thinks tobacco companies are the scum of the earth, I understand your antipathy towards these images. But (as I understand it - I didn't post any of the images), wikipedia presents factual information, including images, within a context (the article), and lets readers decide what to think. Not displaying information because it might, for some people, present a positive image of a disliked group is NOT wikipedia policy.

If you still think the images should be removed, I strongly recommend that you discuss that on the talk/discussion pages of the articles where you plan to do the removal, and see what others say. Otherwise (if you just delete them again), you're likely to be considered a vandal, and this account will be blocked again. John Broughton 00:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC) (P.S. It's common wikipedia courtesy to sign one's comments on talk/discussion pages; if you type four tildas, the software will automatically change those to your signature and date/time (you can use preview to see how this happens).

As you have been warned above about removing these images, this is your last warning. The next time you remove content from a page, you will be blocked from editing Wikipedia. . Wikipedia is not censored. --AbsolutDan ^(talk) 00:37, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Okay, you didn't quite get it. This time you posted on talk/discussion pages, and then immediately removed the images. But the point of a talk/discussion page is DISCUSS changes; it's not really a NOTIFICATION page (the edit summary is perfectly suited for saying, briefly, what an edit is intended for). If you'd given folks a day or two to respond, BEFORE you removed the images, you might have realized that folks don't agree with you, and that wikipedia policy doesn't allow one editor (that would be you) to make such unilateral decisions. So you've gotten another warning, which moves you closer to being permanently blocked.

Please consider doing other, more constructive edits to other wikipedia articles, rather than getting embroiled in a less-than-useful, and eventually futile, quest to remove images that you don't like, but others think are part of the historical record and should be included. There are a lot of articles in wikipedia that DO need more participants to improve them. John Broughton 01:01, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

In addition to John's comments above, I'd like to point out that Wikipedia is not the place for promoting one's beliefs, whether it be to add information or remove it. Wikipedia is meant to contain facts, and that often includes images. Please see the article Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy. There was a significant amount of controversy surrounding the posting of the images in the article. However, as you can see, keeping the image won out in the end. --AbsolutDan ^(talk) 01:49, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

If any of the content of the tobacco-related articles is written as an advertisement, then that is a problem. Articles need to be written from a neutral point of view. If you see articles that fail WP:NPOV, feel free to improve on those (making sure you remain neutral in your edits and cite information from reliable sources). Thanks --AbsolutDan ^(talk) 01:49, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Pro-tobacco folks?

You wrote: I seriously think that people working for Wikipedia and/or Wikipedia itself must be receiving funding by tobacco companies because the tobacco product pages seem to be getting defended a hell of alot.

Sorry, I wouldn't know, but it would surprise me if this were so. Are you saying that the text that appears in articles, concerning tobacco products and tobacco companies, is being defended? Or are you only talking about images (and their removal)? If the former, could you point out some examples?

If you're talking ONLY about removing images, I recommend you follow the link provided above, which I repeat here: WP:CENSOR You seem to think that there should be an exception to this policy, for tobacco comapny advertising images. That policy itself has a talk/discussion page. I really highly recommend that you propose, there, an exception to the policy, and see what kind of reaction you get.

If you're firmly convinced, now or later, that your argument isn't going to be taken seriously, because you think tobacco companies fund wikipedia (odd, because I'm sure that there are a lot of negative things said about them in articles), or that moderators (I'm not sure there actually is such a thing here; perhaps you mean administrators?) are working for the tobacco company (possible; I'm certainly not - my wife and I would just as soon see tobacco advertising folks burn in hell), then perhaps wikipedia isn't the place for you to spend your time fighting this issue. There are blogs, and articles that can be written, and letters to legislators, and much more that can be done in other places, if you don't like how people treat you here.

In short, I advise you to raise the issue in the appropriate places (and NOT to delete images until policy changes or you have a consensus within a given article); listen to what others say and consider their points of view; and then decide whether you want to abide by wikipedia rules and processes or not. John Broughton 01:58, 5 August 2006 (UTC)